A Leesburg woman who once served time for murder was arrested at Wawa earlier this month after threatening a man with a pocketknife.
On Dec. 3, 2005, then 16-year-old Barbara Ann Pullman fatally stabbed her 34-year-old boyfriend in their home at the Lake Worth Beach motel because she was reportedly upset that he saw another woman. The first-degree murder charge was lowered to manslaughter due to her age and mental health concerns, and she served an eight-year sentence from Aug. 2008 to July 2016. Since then, she spent two years of probation in an assisted-living home and has twice violated her probation on marijuana and battery charges.
This past May 14, officers were dispatched to reports of a physical disturbance at Wawa, located at 5726 SE Abshier Boulevard, around 1:09 p.m., according to an arrest report from the Belleview Police Department. A reporting party stated that a woman, later identified as the now 35-year-old Pullman, was threatening someone with a pocketknife and holding it to her arms in a self-harm motion.
Two officers met with the reporting party and a male victim while two other officers spotted a woman matching Pullman’s description leaving the Wawa area. She threw what appeared to be a pocketknife into the bushes. One of the officers detained her in handcuffs, and she admitted to throwing the knife into the bushes because she wanted to cut herself. Shortly after, the knife was found in the bushes where she tried to discard it, the report said.
The victim later advised that while he was sitting at a picnic table outside of Wawa, Pullman became irate that no one would help her fix the back tire of her bicycle, the report said. She took out a silver pocketknife from a bag on her bicycle and began yelling at him. She had the open knife pointed at him and stated, “I’ve been to prison for murder, and I’ll…go back.”
Pullman then held the knife to her arms before running away from the area. Multiple witnesses also stated that they heard Pullman’s remark while pointing the knife at the victim, the report said.
No audio of the incident was recorded by Wawa’s security cameras, but it can clearly be seen in the footage that Pullman approached the victim while leaning over the table. Through her grandiose body language, it could be inferred that she was yelling at the victim, the report said.
The officers with the victim informed the officers detaining Pullman that they had probable cause for her arrest. They subsequently brought her to Wawa and transferred custody over. After being read her rights, Pullman declined to answer any questions, the report said.
Pullman was arrested and charged with aggravated assault. She was transported to Marion County Jail with bond set at $10,000.
